PARK CITY, UTAH (February 6, 2006) -- The best women's ski jumpers in the world will not be competing in the 2006 Torino Olympic Winter Games next week.
Fourteen countries have more than 500 women jumpers participating in FIS Continental Cup competition and club ski jumping programs. The U.S. women's team has four of the top ten jumpers in FIS world standings. And yet Women's Nordic ski jumping remains the only winter sport without an event for female athletes on the Olympic program.
Alissa Johnson (Park City, UT), 18, of the USA knows this all too well. Currently ranked 9th in the world, she'll be in Torino not as an athlete but as a spectator to cheer for her brother Anders Johnson (Park City, UT), 16, a member of the U.S. 2006 Winter Olympic Ski Jumping Team.
The Johnson family has made incredible sacrifices in commitment, time and money to support both Ander's and Alissa's ski jumping. And while the entire Johnson family celebrated Ander's becoming an Olympian and representing America in Torino, it is bittersweet for Alissa.
“I wish we could be there together. Walk through the doors together and experience that together,” said Alissa. “I train as hard as him. I know what it takes to be an Olympic athlete but I may never get that chance.”
Alissa's father Alan Johnson, a former U.S. Ski Team Nordic coach, says “bittersweet” is the appropriate word.
”My son at 15 was ranked about 80th in Continental Cup and I would estimate he would be ranked about 150th in the world now at 16. As a father I am very happy and proud of him. Although his chances of placing in the top 50 would be difficult, just making the team and participating will be interpreted by most people – family, friends, community -- as a huge accomplishment.”
”Yet my daughter's accomplishments are equally successful but she will not have the same recognition. She will have to sit back and watch. She'll root for her brother but at the same time question, ‘Why not me? What's wrong with me? Why can't I have the same experience, recognition for accomplishment, success, walk in the ceremonies and do what everyone else can do?'”
The IOC has made women's participation in sports one of its major concerns in the last twenty years and worked steadily to increase the number of female competitors. According to the Olympic charter the IOC's role is to “encourage and support the promotion of women in sport at all levels and in all structures, with a view to implementing the principle of equality of men and women.”
These efforts on behalf of women in sport have brought us great Olympic moments with women such as Mia Hamm, Cammi Granato and Nikki Stone. "As a female athlete, having the opportunity to compete in Inverted Aerial Skiing in the 1998 Nagano Winter Olympics and bring home the gold was the defining moment in my career,” Nikki Stone said. “ I was fortunate that Aerial Skiing was added as a new Olympic sport in 1994, because in 1991 the IOC required all new Olympic sports include women's events."
In Turino, women will participate in five out of seven sports with Ski Jumping and Nordic Combined (cross-country skiing and ski jumping) being the exceptions. U.S. Women Ski Jumpers would clearly be medal contenders if they were competing in Torino. These women, along with their contemporaries from 14 other nations, have proven they are more than talented—they are among the best in the world. There are more women jumpers worldwide, and competing on a higher scale, now than there were women competing in bobsleigh or skeleton at the time those sports were added to the Olympic program for women. One only has to look at the success and growth of women's skeleton and bobsleigh to see how worthy these pioneering women ski jumpers are of competing on the world stage.
“The old parental adage 'life isn't fair' doesn't cut it here. We're talking about the Olympics, ideals, commitment, sport pioneers,” Alan Johnson continued. ”All the things we want our children and the world to aspire to. When they do and do it successfully and aren't taken seriously, well how would any parent feel? I'm not sure how I will feel and I've had time to prepare.”
Alissa summarized her feelings after finding out the sport would not be included in the Olympics; “I have given so much to this sport. Without it I am just another face in the crowd. I am not an actress or a super model, I am just a woman ski jumper and unfortunately that means next to nothing.”
Alissa is an example of a pure athlete. Right now there is not the Olympic pot at the end of the rainbow. She has persevered through injuries, surgery, and rehab and has come to learn that true winners appreciate and respect challenge and adversity. She is a winner because she appreciates the thrill of competing against the best women in the world and the beautiful feeling that accompanies flying through the air on a ski jump.
For some Olympic hopefuls in the world today like Alissa, gender equality in sports and athletic competition remains elusive. This spring, after the medals are counted from Torino, the FIS will be voting on whether to include women Nordic ski jumpers in FIS sanctioned World Championships and inclusion in the Olympic Winter Games. The outcome of the vote may determine if Alissa will get that cherished shot at inclusion in the next Olympic Winter Games in Vancouver in 2010.